Hi Jake, welcome on Picame! Who are you, how old are you and where do you live?
Hello Picame. I live in Toronto, Canada, which is a great city. Canada is so nice because of the lifestyle and attitude that people have here. It is positive and independent and I always feel lucky to live in such a privileged place. Also Toronto is to me the most culturally interesting cities in our country. In the summer I moved to a great neighborhood here. It is out of the way and has it’s own community.

When and how did you realize that art will be your job?
In high school I thought I would go to business school. I was taking Calculus when I realized that math was driving me crazy. I knew I loved art so I decided to drop out of math and pursue art instead. Art isn’t my only job. I’m a carpenter too; I make furniture and cabinets, which is very satisfying. I love making things with my hands.

You art is quite abstract and rich of symbolism. Where do you take inspiration?
I usually say “nature” because it is the subject of a lot of my work, but I get ideas ideas from many things. Books are good, and movies, and discussions, I guess it is life in general. For me, symbolism is good way to work. I don’t spontaneously come up with images, I have to think about a subject and then code the subject into the images.

Talk us about the creative process behind your works.
I work in pencil (and sometimes pen) and then I add colour in the computer. Sometimes I would rather colour in real life, which I have started to do more often and it feels good. But the computer is such a great tool, it makes everything so flexible. I have a sketchbook but it is not the kind that I would show people. Some people use sketchbooks as practice and they end up with a lot of nice drawings in there. I use mine more like a notebook. It has ideas written down in it and a lot of scribbles that indicate ideas. I’ll often go for a few weeks without drawing in it and then I’ll get a bunch of new ideas at once and put them all in. But my initial drawings don’t look anything close to the finished piece. When I start something new I just open up the sketchbook and pick out some old ideas and see what is working.

What’s on your desk?
There isn’t much on my desk because I try to keep it clean. Of course there is the computer and related objects, and a lot of pencils and pens on my drawing table. I have all these tools but I usually use the same mechanical pencil. My wall is covered because I try to organize my projects using post-it notes. It also has art hanging on it that I have traded other artists for.

Let’s talk about your experience with the Tenax Exhibition.
It has been a really interesting experience. First off, when I was contacted I was amazed that someone in Italy was interested in my work. The internet sends things out to all these places in the world where I never realized people were paying attention to me. I was also surprised because I’m really interested in electronic music, but I don’t think there is anything in my work that suggests that. Somehow the people at Tenax made that connection on their own and I got to be a part of this really cool show. The weirdest part is that I still haven’t seen what my work looks like! I sent them a digital file which they printed in Italy. I have no idea how it turned out (hopefully it looks great).

If you hadn’t become an artist which other work would you have liked to do?
I think about this a lot because I am interested in so many things. If I had a few other lives to live I would definitely be a writer and a musician. Those are the two mediums that I think illicit the greatest emotional response from an audience. They get deep into your brain and heart. They are so powerful because you can’t even see what they are doing, it all exist outside of vision. Also, I’d love to be an architect and focus on sustainable building. The buildings we live in make such an impact on the environment and I’d enjoy working to make them better.

Recommend to us an artist.
A friend, Patrick Kyle, does really awesome stuff. He mostly draws comics and his style it so good.